Our country is founded on basic principles of justice for all.  All people are equal under the laws of our Constitution.  We pride ourselves on freedom of the individual.  No one is above the law or beneath it. We have abolished human slavery.  All for the betterment of mankind.

                                                But wait! 

                  Slavery is not simply old news.  In fact, we are all slaves.

The Bible says it. And Bob Dylan sang it years ago.  “It might be the Devil or it might the Lord. But you gotta serve somebody.”

Chances are we don’t like that idea, in fact, human experience continually proves that we find this idea offensive and intrusive. 

But Dylan was right, our choice is a  binary one:  The Devil or the Lord, life or death. 

Our way through this is lit by a paradox: it is by serving as a slave of God that we find our deepest freedom!!  Various Christian philosophers have commented that the path of slavery is the road to freedom.  How can this be?

In 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 Paul writes.” The fact is, you don’t belong to yourselves, for you were bought at a price. So, use your bodies to glorify God.” 

Notice, Paul is not calling us to be servants of God.  Servants receive a wage.  He calls us to become slaves of God, because we were bought with a price. 

When God calls us to Himself, He calls us to live as His slaves.

Being called slaves rankles our contemporary sensibilities, it tweaks the sin principle living in us.  But Yeshua told us that the only choice we have is to whom we will be enslaved: “Yes, indeed: I tell you that everyone who practices sin is a slave of sin, so if the Son frees you, you will really be free.”
(John 8: 34,36)

 Jesus sets us free to become slaves of God.  We are now free to become the real person that God intends for us, but only if we become His slave!  We long to do His will in our lives. 

If we would know the freedom to which God calls us, we must remember we are not hired, we are owned.  We have been bought by the kindest of Masters with the most precious of prices…….. the blood of His Only Begotten Son. 

                                  So, who are you gonna serve?

“It might be the Devil, and it might be the Lord, but you gotta serve somebody.”